Method for ornamenting the surface of strip materials



Jun 2Q, 1933.

cs. PRIFOLD ,252 METHOD FOR ORNAMENTING THE SURFACE OF STRIP MATERIALS Filed July 5, 19:52 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 ATTORNEY June 20, 1933. 3. PRIFOLD METHOD FOR ORNAMENTING THE SURFACE OF STRIP MATERIALS Filed July 5, 1932 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 M d 3 ATTORNEY Patented June 20, 1933 warren STATES PATENT OFFICE GEORGE PRIFOLD, OF SOMERVILLE, NEVI' JERSEY, ASSIGNOR TO THE COTT-A-LAP COMPANY, OF SODIERVILLE, NEW JERSEY, A CORPORATION OF NEVV' JERSEY METHOD FOR ORNAMENTING THE SURFACE OF STRIP MATERIALS Application filed July 5, 1932. Serial No. 620,771.

This invention relates to a method for ornamenting. the surface of strip materials and to an apparatus for carrying out the method.

The invention aims to produce a blurred or stippled eifect on strip material having a painted surface, such as the strip materials used for floor coverings, and customarily known as linoleum, and also oil cloths and similar materials.

The stippledor blurred efiect is produced by printing difierent colors on the strip in spots or blotches and then applying to the wet paint a brush, felt, or equivalent device which has the effect of blurring the printed colors.

Attempts have been made to obtain such an effect in a block printing machine by substituting for one of the printing blocks a felt covered block termed a masher. While the application of such a block has the efiect of blurring the colors, the results produced are not satisfactory, as lines across the material are discernible at the edges of each impression of the masher. By the present invention, the blurring effect of a masher can be obtained without such objectionable lines and other blurred and streaked effects are also obtainable.

In accordance with the present invention,

39 a cylindrical brush or masher is maintained in contact with the strip after the colors have been printed on it and is so moved that it either has no rubbing movement on the strip or has a constant rubbing movement of such extent as may be deslred.

The apparatus of the present invention constitutes an improvement in the apparatus for ornamenting the surface of strip materials described and claimed in my Patent No. 1,85%,666, issued April 26, 1932, and, like that apparatus, constitutes an attachment readily applicable to a block printing machine of the type customarily used in printing floor coverings. An illustrative embodiment of the apparatus is shown in the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 is a partial side elevation of a block printing machine, embodying the apparatus features of my invention and omitting the parts which are unnecessary to an explanation of my invention; and

Figs. 2, 3 and 4 show my attachment, Fig. 2 being an enlarged transverse section on the line 22 of Fig. 1; Fig. 3 being a section on the line 3-3 of Fig. 2; and Fig. 4 belng a section on the line 4.-4 of Fig. 2.

Flg. 1 shows a block printing machine of conventional construction. It is provided with a bed 10 over which travel feeding bands 11 for intermittently moving a strip of material along the bed, and with a plurality of printing heads 13. At the right-hand end of the figure is shown the customary mechanlsm for causing the intermittent movement of the feeding bands 11. This mechanism includes a drum 14 for each band 11, carrying a ratchet 15 which isengaged by a pawl 16 oscillated by a segment gear 17 on a pivoted arm 18 which is lifted and allowed to fall through the engagement between a follower 19 and a cam 20 fixed on a cross-shaft 21 at the end of the machine. The cam rotates in a clockwise direction so that the feeding bands 11 are moved during more than onehalf of the revolution of the cam while the follower 19 is travelling on the rising face XY of the cam, and remain stationary during the remainder of each revolution of the cam. The printing heads 13 are operated intermittently by the usual cams 22 on crossshafts 23 whose movements are synchronized with those of the cross-shaft 21 of the feeding mechanism by a longitudinal shaft 24: which is connected with each of the cross-shafts by a gearing of the same gear ratio. The printing heads are held in raised position during the movements of the feeding bands 11 and descend to apply paint from their painting blocks to the strip material on the bed during the periods when the feeding bands 11 are stationary.

In accordance with the invention of my Patent No. 1,854,666, one of the printing heads 13a is held up by means of blocks 25, so that it is out of contact with its cam, which may be removed. On the cross-beams 26 of this printing head are clamped two frames 27 in which are journalled two cross-shafts 28, 29. On the frames 27 are pivots 30 to which are secured the upper ends of two arms 31 which depend between the cross-beams 26 through the space ordinarily occupied by the printing blocks, which, in this case, are removed. The arms 31 contain slots 32 into which project crank pins 33 on disks 34 fixed on the ends of the shaft 29. The lower ends of the arms 31 have a pin and slot connection with a slide 35, consisting of bearing blocks slidably mounted on rods 36 carried by frames 37 clamped to the cross-beams 26. The shaft 29 is driven from the cam-shaft 23a associated with the printing head 13a by a pair of gears 40, 41 fixed on the shafts 29, 28

respectively, and a pair of sprockets 42, 43,.

fixed on the shaft 28 and its cam-shaft 23a and connected by a sprocket chain 44. The two gears and the two sprockets each have a one-to-one ratio, so that the rate of revolution of the shaft 29 isequal to that of the crossshaft 23a and also that of the cross-shaft 21. By proper positioning of the parts when the sprocket chain 44 is applied, the crank pins 33 are placed in their uppermost positions when the middle point Z of the rising surface X-Y of the cam is in engagement with the follower 19.

' Bearing in mind the fact that the shaft 29 and the 'cross-shaft 21 rotate in the same direction and at the same speed, it will be seen that the slide has a back and forth movement synchronized with the intermittent movement of the feeding bands 11 and the strip of material carried thereby, so that the slide is moved forward with the strip of material, but at a slower rate than that of the material, during the forward movements of the material; and is moved back over the surface of the material during the period that the material is at rest and also during the moments when the material starts and stops its movement. This result is attained because of the fact that the amplitude of the reciprocation of the slide is considerably less than the distance travelled by the material at each movement thereof, the latter being, of course, equal to that between successive printing heads. Furthermore, the fact that the material is moved forward during more than one-half of each revolution of the cross-shafts while the slide is moved backward during more than one-half of each such revolution namely, while the pins 33 are travelling from the position 33X to the position 33Y-insures a backward travel of the slide during the moments when the material is starting and stopping. The effect of the intermittent movement of the material combined with the reciprocatory movement of the slide is that there is an uninterrupted relative movement between the slide and the material. This relative movement is not only continuous and constant in direction, but is also of a nearly constant rate, that is to'say, the rate of movement of the material toward the right (Fig.

1), which varies from zero to maximum, minus the rate of movement of the slide towards the right, which varies between positive and negative values each less than said maximum, has at every instant a nearly constant value, which represents the relative movement between the slide and the material.

In the apparatus shown in my Patent No. 1,854,666, a brush or blending device was di rectly attached to the slide, so that the opering the slide 35 are provided with hearings in which is journaled transverse shaft 50, on which is fixed a cylinder 51, whose peripheral surface is covered with felt or other suitable material, so that it constitutes a brush or blending device. The lowest portion of this cylindrical surface 52 is in contact with the strip material.

Cylinder 51 and its brushing surface 52 are reciprocated with the slide, and at the same time are given rotary movement. The cylinder may be rotated by a chain 53 meshing with a sprocket 54 fixed on the cylinder shaft and driven by a sprocket 55 fixed on a stud shaft 56 journalled in the frames 27' and driven from the shaft 29 by a pair of gears 57. To maintain the chain 53 in position to engage the sprocket 54 throughout the reciprocation of the slide, the chain is passed over idler sprockets 58 on the frames 37.

When it is desired to produce'a stippled effect without streaking of the paint, the sprockets and gears are arranged as shown in the drawings to rotate the cylinder 51 constantly in an anti-clockwise direction (Fig. 3) atv such speed that the rate of the rotary movement of its peripheral brushing surface 52 is substantially equal to the rate of relative movement between the slide and material, i

which, as above explained, is substantially constant. This results in a rolling movement of the cylinder with respect to the strip, with practically no rubbing or relative movement between the strip material and the operative portion of the brush in contact with it.

Where streaked efi'ects are desired, they maybe obtained by altering the gear ratio between the gears 57 (or between the sprockets 54 and 55) so as to attain any desired rate of rubbing movement between the operative portion of the brush and the strip material. This simple'apparatus, therefore, provides means for obtaining either a stippled effect with no rubbing or many different types of streaked effects caused by different degrees or rates of rubbing between the brush and the strip material.

hat I claim is:

1. The method of producing an ornamental surface on a strip material, which comprises successively printing on successive lengths of the strip paints of a plurality of colors, main t aining a cylinder in contact with each length of the strip shortly after the colors have been printed thereon and while the paint is still wet, and causing uninterrupted rolling movement of the cylinder with respect to the strip throughout the operation of printing the entire strip.

2. The method of producing an ornamental surface on a strip material, which consists of intermittently moving the strip, successively printing paints of a plurality of colors on successive lengths of the strip during its period of rest, maintaining a cylinder in contact with each length of the strip shortly after the colors have been printed thereon and while the paint is still wet, and causing uninterrupted rolling movement of the cylinder with respect to the strip without substantial rubbing.

3. The method of producing an ornamental surface on a strip material, which consists of intermittently moving the strip, successively printing paints of a plurality of colors on successive lengths of the strip during its period of rest, maintaining a cylinder in contact with each length of the strip shortly after the colors have been printed thereon and while the paint is still wet, and causing uninterrupted rolling and rubbing movement of the cylinder with respect to the strip.

4. In a method of producing an ornamental surface on strip material by printing, the steps consisting in moving printed material forwardly in a step-by-step manner, moving a cylinder thereover, while the print on the said printed material is still wet, and maintaining a relative rolling movement of the cylinder with respect to the strip at all times.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand.

GEORGE PRIFOLD. 

